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...to the website of the James McGregor Stewart Society. We want to change the outlook for people with disabilities. Please share this site with friends.
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August 13, 2007

Be Heard!

You can help! Become an activist!

If you are as busy as everyone else, it's hard to find time to write your government representatives. To make it easier, here is an all purpose email that you can modify a bit to fit your requirements.

Should you write to the Prime Minister? It's up to you. Think of yourself as a vote, not a person......

Start a new email, and copy and paste these addresses (adding and subtracting as you wish) into the TO: box:

Copy and paste this blue text into the body of your email with any changes you may wish to make:

Dear Representative,

I am writing about the deplorable state of access at ____________ on ___________. Although some slight modifications have been made, they seem to have been done without any recognized standard. The power doors are too narrow for wheelchairs, the buttons are impossibly located and the short ramps replacing the step is too steep. I am baffled that _____________ was able to receive a permit while excluding me and others like me. Would they get a permit if their sign said "No Politicians"?

I am also writing to remind you of the urgent necessity to acknowledge and promote the equity rights of persons with Disabilities. Here are are some of the many issues that need attention:

For government

All programs, existing and proposed, must be reviewed for disability neutrality

Government's stated goal is the full and unfettered participation of disabled people in their democracy

For Charities focusing on disabilities

Recruit directors from among those intended to benefit

No events in which disabled people can't participate as equals

No stereotyping of disabled people in image or word.

For media

No images or language that imply separate standards for disabled people

For Business

Value every customer equally, and promise to provide safe and dignified access.

For everyone

Do not assume the principal goal of disabled people is a "normal" life.

One in One Thousand - The forgotten legacy of James McGregor Stewart

James McGregor Stewart, 1889-1955, son of a Pictou lawyer, grandson of a Cape Breton minister, was a principal of Stewart, McKelvey, the downtown Halifax law firm. In his time he was Nova Scotia’s premier corporate lawyer, and he wrote the rules for many of our most successful and long-lived companies. He was president of the Canadian Bar between the wars. He is one of fewer than 500 Canadians to be awarded the Commander of the British Empire for services to the Empire in WW II. His obituary was in the New York Times.
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